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Welcome back to our next currency report, which kicks off a brand new week for us on the currency markets. Last time we finished off with a mixture of results as always, so we shall be looking back at those before we focus on looking ahead to the new week.

We had two good results out of five to end last week with on the currency converter, with the pound dropping against the Euro, the New Zealand dollar and the Australian dollar. The Euro got the better of us by letting us drop by half a cent, while the New Zealand dollar saw the pound lose nearly two cents. And things weren’t any better over in Australia either, as the pound lost out on nearly one and a half cents there.

So will this week begin any differently? We did at least have two good results last week, although when we say ‘good’ they were really not anything spectacular. We managed to gain 0.0071 against the US dollar and 0.046 against the Hong Kong dollar, so there was nothing mind blowing there for us to celebrate.

But will this week begin on a different note? Can we try and get some better results to finish off this report with? Let’s find out the answers right now.

An overview of the currency markets for June 21st – June 22nd 2010

We start as always with the US dollar, to see if the British pound could get the better of it during this first exchange of the week. The starting rate here was 1.4804, as the pound edges nearer to regaining the $1.50 threshold it has not seen for some time now.

By the end of day one on this particular occasion, the pound managed to go up slightly against the US dollar, bringing it to a slightly better 1.4855 by the close of play. But if that set us up to feel quite confident at the start of the day, we wouldn’t feel the same way just twenty four hours later.

Instead we would be nursing a loss which took us down to 1.4697. This meant we had lost just over a cent since the week had started. Let’s hope we can rectify that during the closing period of the week.

Moving on to the Euro now, we last left the pound on a rate of 1.1966 here. Things have been gradually improving against the single currency, although it hasn’t all been good news. We haven’t perhaps capitalised on the bad news about the future of the single currency as much as we could have done.

By Monday evening things had got a little more interesting as the pound reached an exchange rate of 1.1989. But was this as far as the improvements were going to go?

In fact Tuesday’s final rate for the day was 1.1990, so we had crept up a little more in the right direction. This meant we had added on roughly a quarter of a Euro cent here, so at least that was better than nothing.

Our next stop is the Hong Kong dollar, and from a starting rate of 11.524 we were hoping to be heading in the right direction here as well. Monday got off to the best start we could have hoped for, as the exchange rates finished on 11.544 by the end of the day.

Unfortunately pride does come before a fall and while we were busy celebrating this good start, things went rapidly downhill on Tuesday. 11.436 was the best we could finish with on that day, meaning we had lost out on 0.088 over those two disappointing days.

Moving on to New Zealand now, we had lost nearly two cents here as the previous week closed. This left us on 2.1045 so could we better this in any way?

Unfortunately Monday’s answer gave us a resounding ‘no’, as we slid right down to 2.0799 by the close of play that day. After this we were prepared for another loss on Tuesday, but fortunately we at least managed to fend this off by finishing on a slightly better 2.0820. This did not get us back into positive territory by the end of these two days though; instead we lost out on two and a quarter cents.

Finally we have the Australian dollar to look at. The last time we left it we had an exchange rate of 1.7050, so here we could hope for something better than we had experienced with the Kiwi dollar.

Unfortunately it was not to be, and we finished up on 1.6822 by the end of Monday night. One more day and we found ourselves on 1.6801, which meant we had an even bigger loss than we expected to find. A loss of two and a half cents was totalled up here.

Notable events in the world of currency

Pound drops against Russian ruble

The pound fell against this currency as well, with a rate of 45.930 on Friday switching to 45.572 by Tuesday evening.

Another loss against the Canadian dollar

1.5224 was the closing rate last week against the Canadian dollar, and this slipped back to 1.5027 by Tuesday night.

A bad week gets worse for the pound

It certainly hasn’t been a good start for the British pound, as we have also lost out against the Thai baht. Friday’s closing rate was 47.972 and by Tuesday this had fallen to 47.518.

The Malaysian ringgit has been suffering as well lately, as this story from the Bloomberg site here testifies. But the news is not good as there are worries the global recovery could be stalling. Could this lead to more bad results in the currency markets?

So there we have it for another week. The first two days have not been the best for the pound, but hopefully as the week really gets into its stride we shall see some better results to close out the week with.

Comment

I am cheating a bit here because I have also read the report which follows this for the second half of this week. This particular one was disappointing but it does go to show how different things can be within the space of just a few days.

I think the most notable thing about the pound is how it has varied results against other currencies and not just the main five each week. We’ve seen this from the extra bits at the ends of these articles each time and I for one really enjoy them. They can give us a more rounded feel to the article and I wouldn’t want to see them go. I’m sure they won’t but I just wanted to get my opinion in!